The Right has long owned ideas of government efficiency and cutting red tape, using them to carry out austerity. With the Commission on Government Efficiency (yes, COGE), Zohran Mamdani is attempting to claim the cause of good government for the Left.
How Should Socialists Relate to the Market?
Bourgeois economics treats capitalism as simply a market economy. Vivek Chibber traces how markets and private ownership worked under feudalism and under capitalism, and argues that socialism could use markets without restoring class society.
What Cedric Robinson’s Black Marxism Gets Wrong
Cedric Robinson’s Black Marxism has become a touchstone for the Left on race and capitalism. August Nimtz argues that it misreads Karl Marx, erases black revolutionaries who were Marxists, and gives up on the working class.
US Imperialism Has Its Own Reasons for War in the Middle East
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt blamed Israel for America’s Middle Eastern fiascos. But from Iraq to Iran, Washington has had its own reasons for war in the Gulf.
The Uprising We Got vs. the One We Need
Paul Greengrass’s The Uprising takes on the English Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 with his trademarked “gritty realist” style. The result is a glum plod through the 14th century. This is Robin Hood and His Morose Men when our times call for something much more.
The real choice is not between globalization and deglobalization, free trade and tariff walls, but between empowering capital and empowering workers.
Treasury Market Volatility Is Capital Disciplining the State
As concerns over inflation have mounted, borrowing costs for the US state have risen sharply. The bond market volatility is capital cracking down on the state’s debt-fueled spending spree, and workers are set to pay for the belt-tightening.
Bari Weiss’s Most Loyal Soldier
For Olivia Reingold, one of the most prominent and prolific contributors to The Free Press, defending Israel takes priority over the facts.
The Last Revolutionary Filmmaker
Japanese filmmaker Masao Adachi spent nearly three decades in Lebanon alongside the Palestinian resistance. Today, stripped of his passport and largely ignored at home, he’s making the most politically alive cinema in Japan at 87 years old.
The Foundations of Turkey’s Peace With the Kurds Are Shaky
The disarmament of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party and promised release of its prisoners offers a path to pacifying conflict in Turkey. It’s less clear if the Turkish state is ready to compromise with Kurds’ democratic demands.
Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s Empire became a campus sensation because it offered a master theory for globalization at a moment when old Marxist categories seemed exhausted. But the capitalist internationalism they saw as permanent has now crashed and burned.
Zack Polanski’s Eco-Populism Could Do With More Socialism
A year since the Green Party of England and Wales elected Zack Polanski as leader, its membership has nearly quadrupled. His rise speaks to dissatisfaction with Labour but also the difficulty of building a deep-rooted alternative.
The Left Should Start Using the Word “Evil”
According to philosopher Susan Neiman, the Left abandons the concept of good and evil at our own peril. If we refuse to use such morally freighted language, we concede it entirely to people who will use it for immoral ends.
German Centrists Are Smearing Die Linke as Antisemites
Claims that socialist party Die Linke threatens Jewish life in Berlin are shameful lies. Sadly, many desperate German politicians would rather make cheap antisemitism accusations than address the cost-of-living issues that drove Die Linke’s victory.
Five Essential Books for Understanding Imperialism
Vivek Chibber recommends five books that explain how empires work, how capitalism divides the world, and how Marxists have argued about imperialism.